Deepak Hooda Returns to Baroda: A New Chapter in Domestic Cricket
Deepak Hooda’s return to Baroda closes one of domestic cricket’s more bitter chapters. It also quietly opens a new one.
The 31-year-old batting allrounder is set to rejoin his home association five years after walking away in acrimony and rebuilding his career with Rajasthan. Baroda Cricket Association (BCA) CEO Snehal Parikh confirmed the move, and, crucially, confirmed a thaw in the relationship that once exploded into public view.
“Yes, Deepak is coming back to Baroda. He and Krunal (Pandya) have spoken to each other. Everything is sorted between them,” Parikh told TOI, underlining that “all issues between BCA and Hooda had been sorted now.”
That line matters. Because this isn’t just a transfer. It’s a reconciliation.
From walkout to homecoming
In January 2021, on the eve of Baroda’s first match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, Hooda packed his bags and left the team hotel. He wrote to the BCA, alleging that then captain Krunal Pandya’s “bad behaviour”, abusive language and “bullying” had left him “depressed, demoralised and under pressure”.
Baroda’s response was swift and severe. The BCA banned him for the entire 2020-21 season for “indiscipline”. Hooda, one of their brightest batting talents, cut ties and shifted to Rajasthan as a professional for the 2021-22 domestic season.
He didn’t just disappear into the system. He built a substantial domestic résumé.
Across 67 first-class matches, Hooda has piled up 4,267 runs at an average of 45.39, with 14 centuries and 18 fifties, including a highest of 293 not out. With the ball, his off-spin has brought 29 wickets at 41.44, with best figures of 5 for 31.
In List A cricket, he has 3,340 runs in 109 matches at 38.83, with six hundreds and 17 half-centuries, and a top score of 104. His 42 wickets in the format have come at 29.92, highlighted by a five-for (5 for 55).
T20 numbers tell another story: 230 matches, 3,972 runs at 24.67, two centuries, and a highest of 108. Enough to keep him in the mix as a power-hitting middle-order option and a part-time bowler.
That body of work carried him into the India dressing room. Hooda has played 10 ODIs, scoring 153 runs at 25.50 and taking three wickets at 39.66. In 21 T20Is, he has 368 runs at 30.66 and six wickets at a striking average of 12.66. His last India appearance came in a T20I against New Zealand on February 1, 2023.
Now, he circles back to where it all began.
Krunal, Hooda and a reset in Baroda
The most striking detail in Parikh’s confirmation was not the contract, but the conversation: Hooda and Krunal Pandya have spoken and “everything is sorted between them”.
For a dressing room once split by that fallout, this is a major reset. Krunal remains one of Baroda’s most influential figures. Hooda returns as a seasoned professional, no longer the young player caught in a power struggle.
The reunion gives Baroda a powerful middle-order bat and a flexible bowling option. It also signals a more pragmatic, perhaps more mature, approach from all sides. The association, the captain, the player — all have chosen to move on.
Jitesh stays on, Munaf steps in
Baroda’s white-ball plans carry another familiar name. Wicketkeeper-batter Jitesh Sharma will continue to represent Baroda as a guest player, but only in the shorter formats, Parikh confirmed.
Jitesh’s presence alongside Hooda adds heft to Baroda’s limited-overs batting. It gives them two proven finishers in domestic and T20 circuits, both comfortable changing gears and clearing the ropes.
Behind the scenes, the BCA has made a move aimed at the next generation. Former India pacer Munaf Patel has been appointed pace bowling coach and mentor at the BCA academy in Vadodara.
Munaf, who knows exactly what it takes to rise from Baroda’s cricketing outposts to the international stage, now steps into a role shaping the region’s fast-bowling pipeline. For young quicks in the system, that is a significant upgrade in guidance and experience.
Hooda’s return, Krunal’s continued leadership, Jitesh’s white-ball firepower and Munaf’s mentoring presence — Baroda cricket suddenly looks less like a fractured story and more like a project with sharp edges and clear intent. The question now is simple: can this rebuilt core turn reconciliation into results on the field?
